SCCA Members: Letter to SEB
 

The November FastTrack finally posted and it looks like the RX-8's move to D-Street has been removed from the recommended list. The rumors surrounding this removal suggest that the Street Advisory Committee and Solo Events Board both feel that the RX-8 is "too unreliable" and not generating enough interest to continue reinforcing as a competitive car. Obviously, as it current sits in C-Street its buried behind the ND Miata and like the NC Miata its no longer campaigned at the national level. Essentially, the SEB and SAC are looking to sunset the RX-8 by leaving it in C-Street rather than move it along with most of its former competition to D-Street.

Given that the last activity in the BS/CS solo recipes thread was more than two years ago at this point, they might be correct. However, if there are those of you out there still looking to campaign a very cheap and thoroughly competitive RX-8 in the street class I encourage you to write to the SEB and SAC via www.soloeventsboard.com and let them know that the 8 is one of the most accessible ways to get drivers into solo and remains a car with an enthusiastic following.

I mean, moving to DS would just mean fighting STi and EVO if the proposal is adopted.

The STi and Evo don't perform terribly well in the street trim. Part of it is based upon who's still using them but if you look at national level events the non-STi WRX generally outperforms the STI/Evo and is pretty even with the RS which is still campaigned by some of the best. Best example would probably be 2017 nationals, compare the RallyFriends (best time Danny Kao in the RS) to the DS times and they're pretty comparable. The Febreeze86 twins are similarly well situated in DS now. If you go back to the 14-16 time frame (the pre-ND era) CS was essentially a toss-up between the RX-8, NC2 and FRSZ86. Performance-wise there's no reason why the 8 shouldn't be in D-Street even with the rallyfriends moving. That's what makes the decision to not move the 8 so frustrating.

The water-cooler gossip is that the decision to not move the Rx-8 is based less on performance and more upon trying to sunset the Rx8 as a viable option in the street class due to its perceived unpopularity and lack of reliability. There were 4-5 of us writing letters and, at the end of the day if we're the only one's who care then maybe the SEB is right and its time to sunset the 8 from street trim. With that said, I'm still reaching out to everyone here since I hope thats not the case.